NALLAPPA GOUNDER Vs. KAILANNA GOUNDER

JUDGEMENT

(1.) DEFENDANT is petitioner herein. Respondent herein filed O.S.No.37 of 1975 on the file of the District Munsif, Sankari, based on a promissory note, dated 16th February, 1969 for a sum of Rs.3000. He claimed that on 18th December, 1970, a part payment of Rs.50 having been made and defendant having endorsed the suit promissory note the suit filed on 23rd December, 1974 was well within time.

(2.) DEFENDANT admitted the execution of promissory note but claimed that the alleged endorsement, dated 18th December,1979 was a forgery. It appears that the suit was posted to 11th December, 1980 for getting the report of the expert on the allegation of forgery made and the suit was posted again to 15th December, 1980 for trial. On that date, the defendant's counsel was present but as defendant had not received letter about the hearing date, he was absent; and defendant also was called absent and in spite of request made by both counsel for adjournment, the court proceeded to dismiss the suit on 15th December, 1980 without costs. Hence petitioner filed I.A.No.156 of 1981 for restoring the suit narrating the reasons for his non-appearance with formal counter denying every claim made by the defendant-petitioner.

(3.) WHEN both Counsel were asked to clarify as to what the Court below had meant by "statistical purpose" they felt shy to say anything and stated that it is only the Presiding Officer who could explain what had happened. He has already given a finding that he was able to make out the spirit of the order and that it was only for "statistical purpose" this suit had been dismissed. If this is accepted, it would lead to tragedies to litigants, if their valuable claims are dismissed and disposed of in a summary manner merely because the Presiding Officer wants to create an impressive record of his performance. It is incomprehensible that a Judicial Officer could think of dismissing a suit claim, so that he could have a disposal, unmindful of the consequences of his action. The Court below having given a finding to this effect, it shows that there are Judicial Officers in the subordinate Judiciary who dismiss suits merely to" bring into existence a false claim about their disposal. This is a nefarious practice and highly detrimental to valuable claims of litigants who throng to Courts in large numbers; expecting a different treatment in the Judiciary from what they are experiencing elsewhere. Statistical figures being built up for securing grants or concessions or other facilities, cannot be imbibed as a permissible practice, when the duty cast on the Judicial Officer is to dispose of matters on their merits and not for purposes of creating statistical records regarding disposal of cases in a court. By such disposal, there is a great risk involved, because, by chance, if the succeeding Judicial Officer is unaware of the mischief of dereliction of duty committed by his predecessor, it is only the litigant who would suffer the consequences. The very fact that, in the order itself, the learned Judge had recognised the existence of such manner of disposal, would show that, such a practice is going on in the subordinate judiciary. It is a sad reflection on subordinate courts that this sort of dismissal for "statistical purposes" could find judicial recognition and form a ground for passing orders. Judicial personnel can ill-afford to indulge in practices which are obnoxious and highly detrimental to litigant public Dishonest practices by judicial personnel would shake the confidence of the people in the Judiciary. Such dishonest act can never form the basis for passing an order by Courts.